Q.List the characteristics features of Pigeon.

Step 1. Externally, pigeons are feathered, bipedal vertebrates: the body is compact and boat-shaped for a streamlined, aerial life, the forelimbs are entirely modified into wings, and the hind limbs alone support the body's weight on the ground.

Step 2. Physiologically, pigeons are homeothermic (warm-blooded), maintaining a constant body temperature regardless of the surroundings, unlike the poikilothermic frog covered earlier in the chapter.

Step 3. Skeletally, the bones are light due to pneumaticity (air-filled long bones), and the sternum bears a deep keel that anchors the powerful pectoral flight muscles; the beak is toothless, and claws and leg scales complete the exoskeleton alongside the feathers. …

Group the pigeon's characteristic features by external form, skeleton, and the key internal-system adaptations (respiration, circ …

• Listing only 'has feathers and can fly' without the deeper physiological adaptations (four-chambered heart, air sacs, uricotely, single ovary) that this chapter specifically covers. …